Talk:Taiwan
Redirect Taiwan Over Formosa I think their should be a redirect for Taiwan over Formosa. The wiki still lists Taiwan as a wanted page and that is not necessary, as both Taiwan and Formosa are the same place, just with different names. -- 12:15, June 7, 2015 (UTC)Jacob Chesley the Alternate Historian :Waiting for the release of Bombs Away. TR (talk) 15:59, June 7, 2015 (UTC) ::Even if they do call it Formosa in BA, our precedents favor Chesley's position. HT characters only ever talk about Burma, but we redirect that page to Myanmar. They only ever talk about Ceylon, but we redirect that page to Sri Lanka. Et cetera. To stay true to this pattern, we'll have to redirect Formosa to Taiwan either way, so we might as well do it now. Turtle Fan (talk) 03:05, June 9, 2015 (UTC) :::Well, ok, I guess. I just figured we'd do it all at once. I can't imagine BA skipping all references to Taiwan/RoC, so I just anticipated moving it and then adding the appropriate THW sub-section. TR (talk) 04:39, June 9, 2015 (UTC) :::Now that I think about it, we had discussed this before and concluded that we would use OTL, present day names for the articles even if all Turtledove references are to older names. That fits the pattern Turtle Fan describes above. ML4E (talk) 16:09, June 9, 2015 (UTC) ::::We did make that our policy--though I would be remiss if I did not point out that none of our countries' governments and few well-regarded NGOs and IGOs recognize the legitimacy of the regime that changed Burma's name to Myanmar, so the use of that name does carry a certain level of controversy. Turtle Fan (talk) 01:05, June 10, 2015 (UTC) This Wiki's One China Policy Something else to consider, while we're talking about Taiwan, and this is something I definitely feel we should decide on before BA comes out: Taiwan is a place-name, but is not the name of a political unit (though it's often used as such in the Western media). The government in Taipei is the Republic of China, which officially disputes the legitimacy of the government in Beijing, the People's Republic of China. Today the dispute is largely pro forma. (Beijing has promised a military response if Taipei ever attempts a formal secession or declaration of independence but, oddly enough, seems fine with them continuing to dispute the PRC's legitimacy.) In the 1950s, however, the dueling claims of being China's real government were deadly serious. The situation was analogous to the competing German and Korean governments. And since we've already created separate articles on East and West Germany and North and South Korea (rather than prepare to fold everything into the preexisting Germany and Korea articles), I'd recommend we do the same for the Republic and People's Republic of China. The China article can be used for anything pertaining to the geography of the mainland, and Taiwan can serve the same purpose for anything pertaining to its island, but political content would go in the respective government's article. The China article as it now stands contains only sections from stories in which either there was one undisputed Chinese government, or the nature of the Chinese government was not relevant at all. There's a sort-of exception for Worldwar, and making articles that recognize the political distinction might permit us to rewrite some content from that story with greater precision. The bit in GotS where Lee mentions to Davis and Seddon that some of the Kalashnikovs from Rivington bear the cryptic inscription "Made in the People's Republic of China" could be moved to the PRC article. If you all feel this distinction is not worth making, I'll go along with the consensus of the group. However, I do feel this needs to be decided before BA comes out. Turtle Fan (talk) 01:05, June 10, 2015 (UTC) :See our discussion in Talk:China#PRC and RC Articles ML4E (talk) 17:45, June 10, 2015 (UTC) ::We'd discussed this in the China talk page, and I think we vaguely came to the agreement that the PRC page would be moved. But I'm not really sold on that course of action. While I agree that the recognition issue muddied the waters, recognition really had more to do with ideology rather than practical realities, to wit, the CCP controlled (and continues to control) the nation state historically called China, which is essentially the same as the geography controlled by the ROC, which is essentially the same as what was controlled by the Qing Dynasty, etc (I realize there is a lot of complexity I'm glossing over, and if HT favors us with some ancient Chinese stories, we will have to revisit this). Western insistence that Taiwan was the "real China" didn't cause the collapse of the CCP or magically restore the ROC. Contrast this with the Germanies and the Koreas where there was a specific effort to set up whole new political boundaries resulting in new states that were/are demonstrably different from the original states of Germany and Korea. ::I'd argue that China is more analogous to the changes in government in France. We'd discussed the viability of creating articles for the various French governments, but ultimately decided against it because regardless of the government in place, the country is still "France", and the new articles would be of little substance. For about 20 years, as you say, the distinction between the two was a big deal, but in the end, pragmatism won out, and the PRC has been understood to be the "real" China for the better part of 40 years. (I should also point out too, that, from my limited reading, there is increasingly a sense being "Taiwanese" among younger generations in Taiwan.) ::So for those reasons, I argue that the best course of action is a robust OTL section for both China and Taiwan, explain the history, explain that HT has few stories set after 1949, and hope like hell HT never writes about the Three Kingdoms period. TR (talk) 18:13, June 10, 2015 (UTC) :::I've rewritten the introduction to the China article to address the above. I believe this is what you're suggesting? Turtle Fan (talk) 17:33, June 11, 2015 (UTC) ::::Indeed it is. TR (talk) 17:46, June 11, 2015 (UTC) ::::I have no objection to this. I did put the PRC flag back in. I don't know if TF removed it by accident or not but I think it should be here. :::::It was indeed accidental. Now that we're taking sides on which government is legit, I whipped up an Infobox. I also left the RC flag in the article on its own as a nod to the fact that there is a second Chinese government out there, and that it too is significant to HT's canon. Turtle Fan (talk) 18:23, June 11, 2015 (UTC) ::::There is a need for a Joe Steele sub-section which is basically a rehash of OTL. Japan fights to expand into China, Steele imposes an embargo leading to Pearl Harbor and the Pacific Theater with an ultimate US victory without nuclear weapons. Then in 1949, Mao wins the civil war expelling Chiang Kai-Shek leading to purges in the State Department and academia of Chinese experts. ML4E (talk) 18:06, June 11, 2015 (UTC) Intro In spite of the above, the intro is something of a hot mess, with the island's current and former names used interchangeably (in contradiction of our policy). In addition, we switch back and forth from descriptions of an island and of a government that is not legally identified with that island (though practically it is). Someone (without checking the page's history, I have a sneaking suspicion who) has unilaterally made changes to what was written by consensus of the above discussions, and the result is a disorganized article. We should either revert the intro to a date prior to those changes, or give the intro a substantive overhaul. Since reverting would eliminate content which has since been added to story-specific sections, I guess the latter is preferable. Turtle Fan (talk) 03:01, March 3, 2016 (UTC) :Checking your suspicion, I find only piddly little changes to the intro since June 10, 2015. I suggest you work it over and then we can discuss the results if there are concerns. ML4E (talk) 21:44, March 3, 2016 (UTC) ::Yeah, I found the same. Go figure. I guess reversions wouldn't work anyway. Turtle Fan (talk) 00:07, March 4, 2016 (UTC) Formosa in T2G This can probably go.JonathanMarkoff (talk) 06:50, May 29, 2018 (UTC)